Monique Ryan (Kooyong, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Indi for her question. She has asked about my private member's bill entitled Lobbying (Improving Government Honesty and Trust) Bill, also known as the 'clean up politics bill'. This bill introduces several measures to improve trust in government decision-making, including an extension of the register of lobbyists, publication of ministers' diaries and closure of the revolving door between ministries and the private sector.

The member asked whether there is urgency in debating this bill, and there is. I first placed this bill before the House last year. It was not debated. With the help of Senator David Pocock we secured a Senate inquiry into the bill. That received 346 submissions but received only a single day of hearings. That inquiry concluded that the government should improve its regulation of lobbyists' activities in this house. The government has not done so, and it has not indicated any plan to do so.

In this 47th Parliament the member for Indi and many of my crossbench colleagues have placed integrity measures before this House: bills to stop pork-barrelling; bills for truth in political advertising; bills for meaningful and equitable reform of electoral donations—we've seen what goes on with that; bills that stop jobs for mates; and bills to protect whistleblowers. Not one of those bills has been debated by this government.

Like me, the member for Indi was elected in 2022 because her community said that it wanted greater transparency, integrity and honesty in government.

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